Two Indian-American students were among the top 3 winners of the prestigious Intel Science Talent Search contest announced March 15. They also scored big in the 2nd and 3rd place categories for their research.
Amol Punjabi 17, of Marlborough, Massachusetts, won the First Place Medal of Distinction for Basic Research. This prize recognizes finalists who demonstrate exceptional scientific potential through depth of research and analysis. Punjabi developed software that could help drug makers develop new therapies for cancer and heart disease.
Maya Varma, 17, of Cupertino, California,won the First Place Medal of Distinction for Innovation, which celebrates finalists who demonstrate the problem-solving aptitude of an engineer through innovative design and creativity. Varma used $35 worth of hobbyist electronics and free computer-aided design tools to create a low-cost, smartphone-based lung function analyzer that diagnoses lung disease as accurately as expensive devices currently used in medical laboratories.
Both Punjabi and Varma win $150,000 each as did Paige Brown,17, of Bangor, Maine, who won the First Place Medal of Distinction for Global Good for studying the water quality of six environmentally impaired local streams with high E. coli and phosphate contamination levels.
There are also three second-place winners ($75,000), two of them of Indian origin, and three third-place winners ($35,000), two of them of Indian descent.
“The Society congratulates Amol, Paige and Maya,” said Maya Ajmera, president and CEO of Society for Science & the Public and alumna of the Science Talent Search. “They and the rest of the top winners of Intel STS 2016 are using science and technology to help address the problems they see in the world and will be at the forefront of creating the solutions we need for the future. We applaud their curiosity and dedication, and look forward to celebrating stellar young scientists for 75 more years.”
In second place, Meena Jagadeesan, 17, of Naperville, Illinois, won the Second Place Medal of Distinction for Basic Research. She investigated an object in algebraic combinatorics, or the mathematics of counting, to reveal a novel relationship between classes of graphs.
Milind Jagota, 18, of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, won the Second Place Medal of Distinction for Innovation. He studied the performance of random nanowire networks as a less costly alternative to the transparent conductors now used in touchscreen devices.
Michael Zhang, 18, of Berwyn, Pennsylvania, was the third winner in the 2nd place category. He won the Second Place Medal of Distinction for Global Good. He engineered tiny virus-like particles to deliver gene-modifying proteins to target cells for medical therapy by altering the genome of those cells in a controlled way.
Among the third place winners, Kunal Shroff, 17, of Great Falls, Virginia, won the Third Place Medal of Distinction for Basic Research. He discovered new relationships between the key protein associated with Huntington’s disease and the biological processes of cellular death that cause Huntington’s symptoms. His work may lead to new treatments.
Kavya Ravichandran, 17, of Westlake, Ohio, won the Third Place Medal of Distinction for Innovation. She studied the use of nanomedicine to destroy potentially fatal blood clots that can cause heart attacks and strokes.
Nathan Charles Marshall (Nate), 17, of Boise, Idaho, won the Third Place Medal of Distinction for Global Good for his study of marine sediment as it related to climate change.
This year’s finalists hail from 38 schools in 18 states. Of the 1,750 high school seniors who entered the Intel Science Talent Search 2016, 300 were announced as semifinalists in January. Of those, 40 were chosen as finalists and invited to Washington, D.C., to compete for the top nine awards. These finalists join the ranks of other notable Science Talent Search alumni, who over the past 75 years, have gone on to win 12 Nobel Prizes, two Fields Medals, 11 National Medals of Science, 17 MacArthur Foundation Fellowships and even an Academy Award for Best Actress.
The Intel Science Talent Search, the nation’s oldest and most prestigious pre-college science competition, has been bringing together the best and brightest young scientific minds in the United States for 75 years. The 40 finalists each receive at least $7,500.
The competition overall awards $1.6 million to provide the opportunities and resources that students need to become the next generation of inventors, entrepreneurs, and STEM professionals.
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